Android Trojan Sends Messages to Your Contacts Labeling You a Pirate

The Trojan version of Walk and Text pretends to unlock itself, but really sends your personal information to a server elsewhere and then SMS messages everyone in your contacts telling them you're a pirate.

Android has had its fair share of malware issues lately, including a spate of Trojans masquerading as apps in the Android App Market (which Google quickly removed,) but this Trojan isn't the kind you'll find through official channels. The mobile app Walk and Text, which allows you to send text messages to your friends while using your phone's camera to see where you're walking, has been pirated enough times that some rogue Android developer (not affiliated with the company behind the app, to our knowledge) has built a version of the app that's actually a Trojan.

The version of the app, 1.3.7 - one that doesn't exist officially - actually records private data from your phone, sends it to an external server, and then sends SMS messages to your contacts to let them know you're a pirate and a cheapskate.

When you install the Walk and Text Trojan - which is only available if you were trying to pirate it in the first place, so no worries you'd stumble on it through legitimate channels - the app appears to take a few moments upon first run to "activate" or "unlock" itself. What the app is really doing during that time, according to Symantec, is fetching your phones IMEI number, telephone number, and your name and sending it to an external server that's presumably owned by the people that built the app.

When the process is finished and the data is away, the next thing the Trojan does is send an SMS message to everyone in your contacts list with a phone number that says "Hey, just downloaded a pirated app off the Internet, Walk and Text for Android. I'm stupid and cheap, it cost only 1 buck. Don't steal like I did!" When it's finished, it shows you a warning screen that the application isn't licensed, and that "We really hope you learned something from this. Check your phone bill."

The Trojan has caused debate in some circles, usually around the "pirates get what they deserve" versus the "no one deserves this" mentality. It's not the first app that does something punitive to get back at app pirates and it'll likely not be the last, but the moral of the story is to steer clear of unofficial and pirated apps in the first place.